Maritime data analytics company ioCurrents has raised $5 million in Series A-1 financing led by Imagen Capital Partners to facilitate immediate roll-out of ioCurrents’ MarineInsight data analytics platform.

The seemingly endless stream of maritime blockchain projects has had another addition with the launch of a new cryptocurrency called SHIPs (Shipping Industry Participations), which aims to tokenise marine assets to allow them to be traded in small chunks, opening up the asset financing market to a wider range of smaller participants.

300cubits, founder of the TEU cryptocurrency aimed at the global shipping sector, says that it aims to begin distributing free crypto tokens to industry stakeholders from February 2018, as talks continue with major container lines.

Oslo-based Xeneta, a provider of benchmarking and market intelligence systems for containerised ocean freight, is calling for the introduction of ‘commodity’ status for shipping containers, to help the market adjust to rock-bottom rates.